Melissopalynology
by blahosaurus
Summary: It's not that they're giving up hope...it's just harder to keep, sometimes. Older Goku/Tsuna/Yama sandwich, not triangle. Oneshot.


_M__elissopalynology_

The world was breaking.

Slowly, achingly. Shards were peeling off the surface, weakening the core. As much power as the legendary Vongola were supposed to have, they seemed helpless now the Millefiori were taking over like an incurable disease. They seemed to know everything; How to exploit every weakness and every fault. The air that crippled the arcobanelo, the information on each affection and tie. Even a new method of skill and fight. The Vongola, along with every other Mafioso team, could do little more than keep up.

It was killing Tsuna. Sometimes he would revert to his sixteen year old self and see his reign as useless. A mere icon for a kingdom that was crumbling.

But he would not give up hope. He couldn't.

OoO

It was just hard to keep sometimes.

"No." Tsuna clenched his fists, turned slightly away. _No. No_. It was simply impossible.

It had to be.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Tenth, I'm sorry." It was a combination of Gokudera's desperate voice and Yamamoto's hard, thin line of a mouth which convinced Tsuna that it was true.

Reborn was dead.

The invincible, insuperable, best arcobanelo was defeated. Found beside a similarly fated Colonello, with no evidence of a struggle on their bodies. No trace of knives or guns; of legacy or pride or resistance. Discovered only with a different sort of breath in their lungs. There was no falling with the face to the foe in this war.

From the other room, Lal Mirch's cries rang out.

Tsuna clenched his eyes shut hard, hard, as if he were trying to blind himself from the truth. Sometimes the fact that he was the boss of a family of killers was irrelevant; he let the tears scar his cheeks. Ten years, he had been with Reborn, and watched him grow physically as the arcobanelo watched Tsuna turn into a formidable boss.

"Who?" Tsuna demanded. Gokudera didn't flinch at the sound but his eyes were hollow, apologetic. Nothing unusual.

"A new division called the Silver spell. They are trained to get rid of arcobanelo, but have mainly been disposed of," Yamamoto replied in that calm, formal tone which differed so greatly from the teenage laughter which used to proclaim everything a game easily. The sound of it physically hurt Tsuna sometimes because, in the end, it was his fault he had somehow lead them all to this.

"Gather the information team. I want to know about every single individual and how to get rid of them," a hitch of breath betrayed the coldness of the words. "And have a team ready for attack. Also, give me a report on how the construction of the new base in Japan is going," Tsuna ordered.

Yamamoto nodded, glancing only briefly at the salt that still stung from Tsuna's eyes before turning away, only to have the doors of the office be thrown open, crashing against the walls with a force which caused plaster to crack and crumble.

"You! It's your fault!" Lal Mirch screamed, her goggles a mad, vivid red. Her hair reminded Tsuna of Mammon's old tentacles.

Those are gone now, too.

"Why did you send them?! They were already injured, you _knew_ that!" She was ranting, raving, screaming, spitting. Gokudera was snarling, instinctive, against the attack.

"Back off, bitch," he growled. Yamamoto's eyes were slightly narrowed.

"Calm down, both of you. It wouldn't have made a difference, Lal Mirch, and you know it. They were the only ones who could do the mission and Tsuna made sure they had the standard three days rest. They were prepared." Maybe Yamamoto's argument would have been more effective if Tsuna hadn't said,

"I'm sorry."

Lal Mirch glared through the rippling red of the goggles and a tear dripped from underneath them.

"You will be. What kind of boss are you? Look at us-"

"Shut the fuck up!"

"They're killing all of us!" Lal Mirch shouted, ignoring Gokudera's outburst. Tsuna looked at her face, clenched his fists tighter. Tighter still. They ignored each other's tears.

"No. They're not. The guardian's are still alive-"

"With the rings destroyed! What are-"

"Don't interrupt me." Tsuna's voice was cold and hard like cemetery slab. "I won't allow you to say anything else on the matter. Do not give up hope. We will beat them; we will find a way. I destroyed the rings for a reason. If you cannot understand why without my explanation, then I doubt your want for peace."

Lal Mirch's expression twisted, lemon tongue bitter in her mouth.

"I want peace only at the cost of their lives," she whispered. Tsuna nodded.

"Then that is the difference between us."

Her coat billowed as she twisted, turning her back on him.

Silence is all the more cruel when it is never going to stop.

OoO

Tsuna's first kiss was with Haru. They were seventeen and it was about time.

Tsuna had felt nothing but uncomfortable.

With time he would realise that he simply couldn't marry. Not because anything in specific stopped him; no rules set in Mafioso stone, most of which Reborn seemed to pull out of his ass. But between the danger and the absence, he refused all brides-to-be. In the end he realised Kyoko-chan and Haru-chan were too much like his mother. Could see in them an old echo of the the easy, oblivious ways in which she would accept the pain of a Mafioso husband. And despite all that he had learned about his father, there was still an edge of petty resentment buried inside Tsuna for abandoning him and his mother the way he did. Tsuna couldn't bare the idea of a child holding the same disgust for him. He would have no wife of his cook for three days only to leave her the following week.

Strangely, the second person he kissed was Yamamoto. Maybe because he was so...optimistic. The trait seemed to allow him a submissive open-mindness that was all about giving. In the end, the sword-fighter seemed to accept the sudden development much like he had accepted he was the member of the mafia. It just happened until he was in too deep to get out.

So when he found Tsuna with bloody knuckles after the Millefiore's first, terrible attack, because _he never wanted to be a Mafioso boss anyway,_ he hadn't known what to do except comfort. And if that mean holding Tsuna close so he would stop punching the wall (he remembered the days when violence was never the solution, but there were faded and distant) then that was ok. And if Tsuna stared at him with those abnormally big eyes, so bright from tears, and drew a kiss out of him, then that was ok too. It was just a sort of game, really.

Until it wasn't.

Just like everything else in Yamamoto's life. Really.

So it was ok.

OoO

Tsuna's first kiss with Gokudera was a little more complicated.

It was one of those rare times when both Gokudera and Yamamoto were in the same place with Tsuna. The boss had gone down to the kitchen late at night, going over papers to fill up the hours of worried insomnia, dipping his fingers in the honey pot and licking it off. It was a fetish not many people knew about, being irrationally embarrassed by it. He was in the middle of watching the honey drip from one of his digits when he heard Yamamoto's trademark laugh and he looked up suddenly, blushing. In the low lights of the kitchen he could still see how dilated Yamamoto's eyes were. _In too deep_, they said. And not caring, too.

The tall man walked towards him slowly, with smile that would be a smirk in any other face. Long fingers wrapped around a slender wrist and sticky honey was brought up to open lips. Tsuna watched, fascinated, as Yamamoto bent down and licked the sweetness off Tsuna's finger, feeling the tongue lap at his skin. When the taller man pulled back with a "_yummy"_, there was a smudge of honey on his bottom lips which just couldn't go to waste.

Tsuna helped himself up by the hand on his wrist and brought their lips together, licking at the offending spot before delving deeper into Yamamoto's delicious mouth. Their bodies were pressed against each other in a practiced moment; no use for tenderness in times of war. Tsuna didn't care that the edge of the table dug against his back as he pulled on Yamamoto's hair harder, moaning softly as their tongues pushed against each other. Yamamoto's hands loved Tsuna's hip-bones, sharp and leading to somewhere even better. And Tsuna adored Yamamoto's collar-bones, pointing at pulse points that were the target of Tsuna's teeth before his tongue was drawn back to Yamamoto's carnivorous one. Tsuna stumbled to sit on the table, panting for a second before Yamamoto kissed him again, pulling at brown hair and grinning as he was pulled forwards between Tsuna's open legs. They both moaned lowly as they made contact.

That was about the time when-

"What the...T-tenth?!"

Tsuna practically jumped away from Yamamoto, almost falling flat on his face as Yamamoto caught him, turning to look at Gokudera's unbelieving eyes.

Shit.

Tsuna could see it. Maybe because he was good at it, or because it was obvious, but Gokudera looked betrayed. _He_ was the Tenth's right-hand man. He should be first, closer, more intimate in _every_ aspect of his life.

But apparently...

"Sorry. Sorry," Gokudera muttered, bright red, stumbling out of the room.

"W-wait!" Tsuna stuttered, but the doorway was empty and shocked. With a sigh Tsuna looked up at Yamamoto who was beginning to smile again, nodding. It had to be done.

Tsuna ran out of the room, not that he had to go very far, finding Gokudera slumped against one of the hallway walls, clutching a stick of dynamite. Tsuna's mouth twitched at the sight.

"Gokudera-kun..." he sighed and the man jumped, straightening up at once.

"T-Tenth! I'm sorry, I didn't mean to intrude. I noticed you weren't in your room- not that I was spying on you or anything! I just, I just..." he trailed away as Tsuna nodded, inches away.

"Sorry I didn't tell you, Gokudera-kun," Tsuna mumbled, blushing. He thanked the Gods above it was dark.

"It's...alright..." Gokudera whispered, noticing how swollen Tsuna's lips were, how his tongue swept out to moisten them out of nervousness because being the boss of a bunch of assassins didn't mean he wasn't awkward in such a position

He didn't say anything more, however, just leaned on the tips of his bare toes and kissed Gokudera because if there was one thing he wasn't going to do, it was break his family from the inside out. Not now that they so desperately needed to be strong. He needed ties between himself and the guardians to be without cracks. And not only that, Gokudera was a friend he would never have thought to abandon or betray.

Gokudera gasped typically, a small noise whimpering past teeth, but Tsuna didn't take advantage of the parted lips. He pulled away, opened his eyes to see Gokudera had closed his and then leaned forwards again, lifting a hand to Gokudera's bare chest. Bare, _bare _skin, having forgone a shirt to sleep. Thin fingers trailed bony, awkward, broad shoulders lightly.

"Tenth." A whisper. Tsuna couldn't help but smile. He rarely felt more loved than when he was with Gokudera.

Trembling hands cupped Tsuna's face, trailing downwards, feeling pulse-points that were not nearly as racy as his. It was as if he were holding back a great amount of energy just beneath the surface of his skin, dying to come out. Tsuna pulled back.

"I'm not gonna break, you know," he mumbled, a little embarrassed but slightly amused as well. Gokudera blushed harder.

"I know, Tenth! You're amazing!"

Tsuna sighed but when they kissed again his lips were stretched in a smile.

It had done the trick, though, because Gokudera deepened the kiss with a little whine, pulling Tsuna closer, closer, never close enough. Tsuna's hands were threading through hair, making Gokudera moan and gasp as a finger trailed down a nipple. But-

"Haha, this is going well." Gokudera pulled back with a blush and a glare in an attempt to smite the grin off Yamamoto's lean face. The tall man didn't back down, however, just took a step closer, holding Tsuna's hips from behind in a position that wasn't exactly possessive, but confrontational enough for Gokudera's fingers to itch for an explosion. He was distracted by Tsuna's lips, however, drawing him away, only worth a moment of hesitation before he let the Tenth's tongue hold his full attention. He cracked his eyes open a few second later, however, to see Yamamoto's lips brushing over the base of Tsuna's neck. He closed them again with a hitched moan when fingertips rubbed his nipple again and his eyes remained closed until a kiss, which was certainly not belonging to Tsuna's mouth, was placed on his own shoulder. He flinched away, looking at Yamamoto's grinning face. Anger flared for a second before spotting the half expectant, half weary and overly turned on face of Tsuna. He leaned forward slightly in concession, not even pulling back when he saw Yamamoto's eyes flash before leaning over the tenth, brushing his lips until a tongue flicked out and licked the seal of Gokudera's mouth, which tasted faintly like cigarettes. Almost grudgingly he let his mouth open and Yamamoto's tongue moved much more teasingly, almost drawing a cry out of him. His eyes fluttered open at Tsuna's hitch of breath and Gokudera had to hold back a moan at his face; closed-eyed and pleasured, until he noticed it was Yamamoto's hand between his legs that had produced the emotion, rubbing ever so lightly over the material of his trousers. Not one to be outdone, he reached behind Tsuna, careful not to squish him but grabbing and squeezing his butt as he simultaneously gripped Yamamoto painlessly though his trousers. Yamamoto froze and then laughed hoarsely, leaning forwards slightly to apply more pressure. He moved his moth from Gokudera's, however, applying them to Tsuna's neck once again and Gokudera let his own fall onto Tsuna's lips, letting the younger boy bruise with the force of want. It didn't matter that Yamamoto was there- he would never say it out loud but it almost made it better. And when he saw Tsuna's satisfied smile and his dark eyes, he gave in.

Rarely was defeat as sweet as honey.

OoO

"He can't go! It's obviously a trap!"

"You don't know that, Gokudera. This could be our one chance."

"Chance! Who cares; the Tenth's safety comes first!"

"I know that, but you can't reject their proposal for negotiation without knowing the details."

"I know the freaking details! It's a trap- there, your main detail."

A sigh.

"You don't-"

"Ok, guys." A tired voice. "That's enough. This one decision is just not yours to make. It's mine." Silence. "And I'm going."

"What! Tenth-"

"Gokudera, I know," Tsuna said, re-tying his damned tie. "You're right. It might be a trap. But it might not, and that makes all the difference. I'm going to do anything possible to stop this. If that means going there alone,"

"_Alone_!?"

"Alone. Then that's what I will do." Tsuna sighed, turning to look at the silver-haired man. "I'm sorry but there is nothing you can say. I can't pass up a chance at peace."

"But your safety-"

"My safety is second to all of yours."

"No! That's-"

"It's true. Gokudera, it may seem that all of you are here to protect me, but it's the other way around. I'm the sky, aren't I? I'm the one that holds all of you together, and looks after the ones under me. As unbalanced as it seems, it's the way it is."

Gokudera clenched his fists, looking between Yamamoto's morbid face and Tsuna's resigned one, and knew he could do nothing to change his mind. He has used the same voice when arguing his point with the rings and in the end, what the Tenth chose, went.

"Now let's go to the meeting," Tsuna ordered, a hand brushing hair into place messily as he stood up.

Desperate situations call for desperate solution, after all.

OoO

Gokudera opens his eyes blearily, smiling faintly. There was something tickling his neck. Coarse and light.

"T-tenth?" he asked, the first word from his lips. The warmth next to him shifted and hummed and he saw that it was Tsuna's hair brushing his skin. His smile widened.

"Mornin'" Tsuna replied roughly, coughing the rasping from his neck. Gokudera's pale and faintly freckled arms wrapped around the body next to his, fingers stroking patches of skin. In the few mornings he woke up next to Tsuna there was no need to reach over for the packet of cigarettes. It didn't matter that they had to stretch and get up in a few minutes to face another few sleepless days. Gokudera was all for the art of explosions; beauty was fleeting, but worth it just because of that. Ignoring morning breath, he leaned over to kiss Tsuna, who was extremely mouldable and complacent when just woken up.

"Mmm, haha, Gokudera, is this turning your back at me an offering?" There was a ghost of fingertips across his back, followed by kisses against the back of his neck. Gokudera's eye twitched, but before he could elbow Yamamoto, Tsuna was pulling him harder against his lips, letting his tongue sweep against his, making Gokudera's brain go fuzzy with forgetfulness. Yamamoto's warmth was made more present at his back as the man reached over to put a hand against the Tenth's leg, letting it trail upwards slowly as he nipped and licked and kissed Gokudera's back. Yamamoto grinned against the skin. He only had to distract Gokudera a moment with fingertips against the hardening length in the Italian's boxers in order to roll him over so that he was over Tsuna, an open-mouthed kissed against his lips in an instant. Gokudera cried out in anger but Tsuna was chuckling, pulling Yamamoto closer by his hair, legs open. He moaned deeply as Yamamoto's hand caught him between thighs and rubbed slowly against the material of his boxers.

"Oh, fuck you," Gokudera growled, dipping a finger in the lube on their bed-side table and, yanking Yamamoto's pants down, inserting a digit deep within him. He felt Yamamoto flex and tense and he paused against Tsuna, lips parted, panting against the Tenth's skin. Tsuna's eyes opened and he looked at Yamamoto's face, eyes closed, expression pleasured as he got used to Gokudera quickly out of practice, already two fingers in. The silver-haired man leaned forward, letting his teeth nip at Yamamoto's ear.

"Do you like that?" he whispered, growled, letting his breath heat the sensitive skin behind the ear before lowering to Yamamoto's pulse, nipping it before kissing it roughly. Yamamoto moaned audibly and Tsuna ached with want, arching up, kissing Yamamoto hard. He, in turn, fumbled with Tsuna's boxers, yanking them down and letting his fingers expertly, teasing the head before gripping a little harder.

"Mmmm, Yama, Goku- yama....nnhn," Tsuna cried out. Soon they were moving together in some cosmic tempo, a beast of many names and lives and legs. As close as they could be before the ruptures in the world drove them too far apart.

OoO

"I've arrived at the Millefiore base, and everything is fine, ok Gokudera? All the back-up is set, I'm as safe as I can be. I have my gloves. I can take care of myself," Tsuna said in code, even though he was alone in the room. When in the lion's den, one can never be too sure.

"Ok, Tenth. I know. Just be careful, alright?" Tsuna could tell he was holding a cigarette in his mouth and wondered how many packets he smoked when the Tenth wasn't there to frown at him.

"Don't smoke too much. I'll report back in a few hours or days. Stop worrying." With a smile in his voice Tsuna clicked off the phone. His hands weren't shaking only through practice and strength of will. He wished Reborn were alive. He wished he didn't have to do it in the first place.

But, even if it seemed he had been conned and forced into the position, he had ultimately chosen his own path. He was a Mafioso boss and nothing short of death was going to change that.

Now it was time to prove his worth.

OoO

In the end, Tsuna died with a smile on his face.

Not because he was happy, or accepting. But because he had stepped into the meeting room thinking, _I should give them a chance_. He had never, even after everything that had happened, been one to write someone off as pure evil. He believed that everybody had a breaking point, an ounce of compassion. And the negotiation Millefiore had suggested was the perfect opportunity to draw that out.

The last thing he had seen was the pseudo friendly face of his opponent. He didn't even hear the bang, or feel the pain of the bullet go straight through his head on his blindspot.

One second he was prepared for battle and the next...

The next, he just..._wasn't. _

OoO

Tsuna had been missing only three days before the pictures were put up all over Namamori. Pictures of the tenth Vongola boss, dead on the floor. He had holes instead of ears, but his eyes were unmistakable.

Haru had bent over the pavement and thrown up. His mother had screamed in a way which had scarred the air with pure, mourning denial. Lal Mirch had fisted her hands, closed her eyes. Walked on. Lambo clung to I-Pin as they cried. Lancia had destroyed a concrete wall with his snake-ball. Ken and Chikusa had watched Chrome gasp in horror, knuckles white and gripping Mukuro's heart.

All around the world people had been shocked into silence and screams. And everybody knew who had their fingertips all over this crime.

"No." _No. No._ It just couldn't be true.

Yamamoto closed his eyes. Bent his head. Shook it.

"I'm sorry."

Tsuna was dead.

The invincible, insuperable, amazing, loving, caring, honey-tasting Tenth had been murdered.

"No. No. This can't, this can't-" He couldn't breathe. Someone was crushing his lungs- he couldn't breathe, couldn't br-

"Gokudera." There were hands gripping tight around his arms. Some sort of anchor that didn't work with Tsuna's shores sailing away.

It just...it just couldn't be happening.

Gokudera had depended on the tenth since has was sixteen. For ten long years he had loved him, looked up to him, served him, fought beside him. They couldn't just...just take it away. As if it were _nothing_.

He couldn't have failed like this. Failed him. Failed Tsuna.

"No! Let me go! You fucking- it's your fault! You, you!" he wasn't even thinking. He couldn't _think. _

_The tenth was dead._

But the arms were pulling him forwards, crushing him until it hurt. And he gripped back, choking.

"Please...Yamamoto, don't. Tell me he's ok. Please...Oh God please, Yamamoto...this can't be..."

Yamamoto closed his eyes tight.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

The world was

B r

e

a k

ing.

OoOoOo

For a while the dirt of Tsuna's death tasted like rock bottom.

But things only got worse.

Gokudera didn't know what to do anymore. In the next week they managed to retrieve the body, kill, get killed, and not have a funeral.

Hibari had said the final word on the last one. Gokudera had been desperate for some kind of memorial. Anything. But...

"There will be too many people crowding," Hibari said over the telephone camera, as if he just had to, with that look that said _I bite_. But Gokudera turned red, red, red eyes at him and snarled,

"Shut the fuck up, asshole," and was going to say more until Yamamoto gripped his wrist.

"He's right. It's too dangerous. If we horde in one place for the funeral they will target us and shoot us down. Tsuna would have never-"

Gokudera pulled his arm away with a growl, cutting Yamamoto off.

"Fuck off then. Fuck off, all of you."

When was the coarse feel of hair going to tickle him awake from this impossible nightmare?

O

And people kept dying.

Yamamoto laughed that ugly, deformed, forced laugh and Gokudera was used to feeling helpless, but he couldn't help but think, _what would Tsuna do?_ Probably hug him. Kiss him, tell him it's not ok, it's not ok that your father died, but it will get better.

In the end.

But Gokudera had to pull away because Yamamoto tasted like sushi, and it makes the absence of honey so much worse.

O

So, when Gokudera saw a ghost from ten years past sitting on flowers, he had though,

_About time I went insane. _

OoOoOo

He is in....darkness. For a second he thinks that maybe it really was one of Lambo's grenades and this is heaven.

Dark. And soft. And smelling of honeysuckle flowers.

But it turns out to be something resembling hell.

The first thing he notices is the change in Gokudera's voice. Deeper, rumbling, with an edge to it. All those cigarettes, Tsuna guesses.

And then, when the figure steps from the shadows...no matter if he lived five hundred years more, or ten years less. He would never forget Gokudera's eyes. In the year he had know him the white-haired man had apologised to him countless times, but when the older version gripped his shoulders so tight he had to cry out, Tsuna knows its nothing short of raw, raw desperation. His eyes are bright and sharp like the prince's knives, cutting Tsuna invisibly.

_This man was drowning_. Tsuna thinks.

_What has to happen in a world to make a man look like this? _

O

Tsuna is so lost it isn't even funny.

But there are (semi) familiar faces. A little leaner, a little more scarred. But familiar nonetheless.

And Yamamoto's laugh (almost) hasn't changed.

"You carry band-aids with you?" Yamamoto asked, surprised, as Tsuna tends to Gokudera's knee whilst the silver-haired man apologises about tripping over that very obvious root for the millionth time. Reborn is looking at them. Tsuna shrugs.

"Well, with all the accidents that the kids get into...just in case I have to patch anything up," Tsuna says sheepishly. Yamamoto stares and for the first time in five year he hopes; not because he has to, not because giving up would mean death. He opens his eyes and sees the light at the end of the tunnel- Tsuna's glowing, honey coloured flame of will.

And maybe things will actually get better.

In the end.

oOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

A/N

My first reborn fic! Tsuna sandwich FTW. (With plenty of mayonnaise as well AHA)

Tee-hee, that mayonnaise comment was so unneeded. Love it!

And by the way the title means the raw form of honey (or so wikipidia tells me). In other words I didn't know what the hell to call it so went with something long and pretentious- I mean, *cough*, complicated.

So please welcome me to the fandom and review and I shall feed you more!

FUUUD!

EDIT: This version is edited. And I am quite redundant =P


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